Netflix to bring closed captioning to all video content by 2014

Netflix: 30 percent of Watch Instantly titles subbed with more on the way, plus Xbox & Roku support

It's been a slow climb since Netflix first announced it was adding closed captioning to the PC and Mac in early 2010, but today's blog post indicates its reached 30% of the available titles. So far platforms on the second revision of its streaming frontend like the PS3, Boxee Box, Google TV and Nintendo Wii support optional captions while the Xbox 360 and Roku players should "later this year." Of course, while its per-episode count is significantly higher, it's still only a few hundred of Netflix's available series, and deaf/hard of hearing users face problems like having some episodes subbed while others aren't. Netflix's new page breaking out supported titles should help, while nc-mac-asl's blog or InstantWatcher.com also can provide a filter. The plan is apparently to have subtitles on 80% of content by the end of the year and here's hoping it gets to 100% soon -- makes our quibbling over 5.1 surround sound seem sort of trivial doesn't it? (But, while we're on the subject, Netflix, where's 5.1 on non-PS3 clients?)